Reducing car trips in Atlanta
The quote in this image comes from a Curbed Atlanta interview with Jim Durrett of the Buckhead Community Improvement District (Buckhead is basically the northernmost section of the City of Atlanta). Here’s a longer section from it:There is only so much that can be done to optimize how our streets handle traffic. The next time you lament that you are stuck in traffic, consider that, in fact, you are traffic. That is why we need also to be creating viable options for getting around without use of an automobile and encouraging a healthy mix of office, residential and retail development.I like that instead of just calling for improvement in transportation, he’s pointing out the need for a “healthy mix” of residential, office and retail. You can’t expect good alternatives to car travel to happen unless the built environment is accommodating to safe pedestrian and bicycle mobility. Atlantans often seem to have trouble understanding that relationship between city form and traffic flow, complaining that “MARTA doesn’t go anywhere” and not realizing that it only feels that way because the city sprawls everywhere.Another way of stating this point comes from Fred Kent: “If you plan cities for cars and traffic, you get cars and traffic. If you plan for people and places, you get people and places.”A recent article in the AJC explores the way that the automobile congestion on Atlanta roads is affecting decisions companies make about who they hire and where they locate: “Traffic becomes a factor for Atlanta businesses.” The piece includes this statement about public transit and how it is perceived as not being robust enough for convenient use.“Atlanta motorists and employers alike have long complained that the area’s traffic problems are exacerbated by a largely anemic public transportation system.”I have two things to say about this: 1.) it’s incredible that the word “sprawl” never appears in this article on traffic problems in Atlanta; 2.) the answer to the question “why does Atlanta transit seem anemic” is “sprawl.” When you build environments for large populations in a sprawling, low density pattern, you’re enabling a car-centric way of life. And the roads that connect places in that sprawling pattern are bound to be dangerous for pedestrians.Telecommuting: it helps, but it isn’t the answerThe AJC article goes on to mention telecommuting as a possible salvation for Atlanta’s congestion woes. Reading about telecommuting in recent years, it seems like anti-transit, anti-smart growth types consider it to be a means of conserving the status quo of car-centric development; why promote smart growth and transportation alternative when we can just work from home, right?But a careful look at the numbers shows something surprising: a big rise in telecommuting has not produced a big fall in car congestion.The number of teleworkers in metro Atlanta is up a huge 61 percent since 2010. So traffic congestion should be down during that time period, right? Nope, not according to the stats presented in the AJC piece itself: “What was an average one-way commute of 17 miles and 30 minutes just five years ago grew into an average commute of 18 miles and 34 minutes in 2014.”Teleworking is a great thing and I’m sure it has had a positive effect in getting cars of the road to some extent. But for a sustainable means of reducing car trips, the key will be to make our places more safe, inviting and convenient for walking and cycling. An important component for that goal will be better development, the kind that puts destinations and residences in a thoughtful configuration for multimodal connection.
